Indelible
by Silksteel
Summary: She's a seventeen-year old fugitive civilian; he's a defecting sniper in the US Army. They both take their comfort where they can. TammyxDoyle. Complete.
1. Shelter

**Disclaimer: **I don't own anything, it all belongs to people far richer than me.

**Author's Note: **This is a five-chapter ficlet (three and three-quarters of which I have written already) set - if you can suspend your disbelief for a moment - during an imaginary period of time between the gang escaping from District 1 and dawn when Flynn arrives in his helicopter. Oh, and please note the rating. It is there for a reason.

**Indelible**

_By_

_Silksteel_

Whilst it would have been most sensible to keep moving, the reality of it was that Scarlet was injured, not capable of carrying on through the night and into dawn. Besides that, everyone was drained from the escape, terrified of the morning and the return to the old madness of Infected London. She hadn't been there the first time around, but the haunted look she'd seen in her father's eyes – and later the nightmare in her mother's for those few infinitesimal moments they'd had prior to containment – told her all she needed to know. Now they were both gone, and all she had to focus on was Andy; Andy who was so much of their mother that she could hardly bear to look at him. Andy was all she had left, and the last hope for a cure unless another such anomaly could be found. Even then, they were the only ones who knew about it; if Scarlet had managed to communicate the fact to her superiors there was no chance they'd have let the siblings leave – let alone disappear into the Infected mob.

To all ends, Doyle called a halt, finding them shelter outside the central containment zone. They were far enough from the epicentre to take their ease for a little while yet, but most of them were too keyed up to sleep – except Andy, apparently, who seemed to know he had little to fear from their assailants. Tammy sat next to him, his body curled into the unyielding wall, and stroked his hair tenderly away from his face. They'd never been close...before. She felt eyes on her, and glanced up to meet Doyle's gaze. The sergeant smiled, but Tammy didn't return it. She felt hopeless.

'Tammy,' he said quietly, holding out a hand to her. 'Join me?'

She stared at him a moment, the concern in his eyes, before eventually accepting his gesture and rising. Scarlet was peeling away the bandaging from her leg, and Doyle blanched, turning away quickly. She followed him out into an adjoining room in the abandoned house, with a view over a park, startlingly beautiful in the moonlight for all that it was overgrown and deadly. They kept low and away from the windows, concealing themselves in an alcove. They had enough light to see by and so didn't need to chance such paltry things that might give them away.

'You and Scarlet –' she began, when he'd neglected to speak for several minutes.

'Yes?' Doyle prompted, adjusting the rifle across his thighs, probably for something to do with his hands, she thought.

'You keep giving each other these looks. When you think we aren't watching. Like –' she hesitated. 'Are we going to get through this, Sergeant Doyle?'

The older man looked uncomfortable. 'Jim,' he corrected, fiddling with his shoulder strap. Their knees brushed awkwardly in the small space. 'And I don't know.'

Tammy sat back against the wall, breathed in the musty air and looked up at the moonlight filtering through the dirty glass window. 'I'm glad you didn't lie to me,' she said finally, picking at a hole in the knee of her jeans. The thought of death, in whatever form it came – she knew her preference – wasn't the spectre she thought it should be. With people dying all around her, Tammy found it easier to come to terms with her own mortality. But – 'I don't want this for Andy.' She looked up into Doyle's unreadable expression. 'He's the key to ending...all of this.' Tammy swallowed a lump in her throat, managed a quiet, choked laugh. 'If there _can _be an end to it.'


	2. Promises

**Disclaimer: **I don't own anything, it all belongs to people far richer than me.

**Indelible**

_By_

_Silksteel_

Sergeant Jim Doyle had been part of citizen defence, chosen for his skills with a sniper rifle and shipped overseas, far from home, to help with a war that no one really understood. All they knew was that the virus was deadly. They were briefed in all sorts of strategies for containment and extermination of the Infected – but not taught how to close themselves off from the living, those who needed their protection most when they'd been ordered to shoot anything that moved. Doyle had defected for reasons he hadn't yet gone into with Scarlet, and perhaps never would – though if there was anyone placed well to know what torment he'd gone through in making such a decision, it was her.

For the moment it wasn't his colleague but her younger counterpart that concerned him. The girl had seen far more than any her age should have to endure, and it was only through her almost slavish devotion to her brother that she hadn't broken yet - for that he could admit admiration, as well as no small amount of worry. He and Scarlet were trained for this, and his colleague was fanatic with her theory on Tammy's brother being the cure. Whether he was or not was moot, as far as Doyle was concerned. If that was where she got her comfort, all the better. Andy himself seemed detached from the proceedings, an eerie, fearless spectre next to his more emotive sister. Doyle hadn't forgotten the fact that it was the youngest of them to have braved the sniper back in central London.

'We'll have a better run at it once dawn comes,' Doyle promised, knowing that it was a token vow for all the truth in it. He couldn't say whether or not any of them would survive the next day, let alone long enough to reach the safety of another country – or even continent. What he meant was that they'd be rested and ready – as ready as they could be – to face whatever came their way. And Flynn would be there, hopefully, to save their collective asses.

'Jim –'

'Mmm?'

'Do you have someone waiting for you back home?'

Doyle looked over at her, surprised by the question. She seemed awkward now, worrying her lower lip with sharp white teeth. She was pretty, he noticed absently, even beneath the coat of grime they'd picked up along the way. Her face was unusually striking; huge, wide-set blue eyes giving her the look of a startled fawn, and her angular face framed by a cloud of wild blond hair. She couldn't have been more than seventeen.

'Only my momma,' he said finally, trying to interject a joking tone into his voice but it fell flat before coming to fruition. Tammy gave him an unsteady smile, the first he'd coaxed out of her since they'd met. Even though it was bittersweet, it was a relief to see it at all.

'I'm sure she's proud of you,' Tammy managed at last, and in the faint light he could see the glimmer of tears in her eyes. It was a long time coming in his opinion, given all that had happened in the last few hours. To find her mother alive only have the hope snatched away irrevocably would tax most hearts.


	3. Need

**Disclaimer: **I don't own anything, it all belongs to people far richer than me.

**Indelible**

_By_

_Silksteel_

She hadn't meant to cry, it just sort of happened. Doyle gave her time and space, neither of which she'd managed in the panic of the last few hours, from discovering her parents were dead or Infected, to losing Andy and finding him again, and the heart-stopping moment when he'd wrenched free of her grip and dashed across the road, pursued by sniper fire. Through it all she'd pressed on, hoping that pure adrenaline would carry her – and so it had, until an innocent answer from the sergeant.

Doyle opened his arms to her, the rifle set aside at last, and she sank gratefully into a stranger's embrace. He held her there in the silence, stroking her hair as her body shook violently with the sorrow she couldn't show her brother who relied on her to be strong. Tammy wouldn't trade for anything, and nor would she forsake that duty she'd taken on out of love for her sibling, but it was relief not to hold up the same barriers here.

'I'm sorry,' she mumbled eventually into his throat where chance had dictated she bury her face. He smelled like November bonfires, cold air and the musky tang of sweat, and Tammy breathed him in deeply. She couldn't tell whether they'd been sitting there for minutes or hours.

'You needed it,' Doyle replied simply, brushing back damp strands of hair from her face, his fingers rough with calluses from hard work. He smiled, cupped her chin between strong hands. 'Better now?'

She couldn't tell what colour his eyes were in the dim light, but they radiated warmth, reflecting what sort of man he might have been if this war had never happened, if he'd never been drafted in to face all of this. Tammy held onto that gaze like a safety line as she plunged head first into an uncertain future, and closed her eyes as her lips met his.

It lasted for a moment that was endless. From shocked immobility she galvanised the sergeant into meeting her at equal intensity; there was an edge of desperation to their kiss, as they both sought a resolution neither could offer. Doyle opened to her, allowing her far more than she guessed he might, under the circumstances, and she kissed him deeply, trying to find the deepest centre of him and hide herself away there.

'Tammy –' he protested at last, breaking away to look at her properly, but she shook her head, taking the opportunity to climb fully into his lap and prevent him from rising.

'Please,' she whispered in return, placing fevered kisses along the line of his jaw, his throat, as her fingers worked at the straps of his bullet proof vest. 'Let me have this.' For whatever his protest – her age, her innocence – or what remained of it – the fact that they were strangers...she was sure she didn't want to hear it. All they had was here and now, and Tammy couldn't bear the thought of wasting even a moment when she might not get another.

Doyle didn't speak again, complying with her bold moves in a dazed sort of way, allowing her to remove his flak jacket and shirt without protest. The only sign of his thoughts was the hitch in his breathing, and his apparent refusal to relinquish his hold on her, both of those capable hands wrapped around her waist. Tammy crowded in close to him, dipping her head to close her mouth over his skin, tasting salty sweetness as she felt him finally reach for the hem of her t-shirt.

It wasn't giving in. They both needed this.


	4. Resolution

**Disclaimer: **I don't own anything, it all belongs to people far richer than me.

**Indelible**

_By_

_Silksteel_

As soon as he saw that stubborn chin tremble he knew what was coming, and come it did, sudden and intense like a flash flood. The calm afterwards bore an uncanny resemblance to just such an occasion in nature, and he took both with characteristic good humour. If she'd shown no emotion at all beyond what he'd already seen, Doyle would have worried for her. As it was, Tammy was as human, as fallible as the rest of them, and all that she needed was just someone to ask the right questions – and more importantly, listen to the answers, even if it was all implicit.

He held her, rocking her slightly against his body, shielded from the real and imaginary horrors of their situation by his arms, for what felt like an instant and an hour all at once. Whilst slightly puffy, her eyes were dry once they met his again, and it seemed that suddenly she was kissing him when he had no memory of what had gone on before.

Doyle had always tried to be a good man. Not taking advantage of his young charge – where he came from she probably wasn't even legal, even though she might have been here – wasn't setting the bar too high, but he should have been able to manage it. She tasted like lemon drops he noticed, trying not to think on how long it had been since he last had a warm and willing body in his arms, and her plea cutting down his protests where they stood.

Her attentions, at once so unexpected and so hesitant, told him all he needed to know about her level of experience. Doyle decided that he best not get himself killed before he had time to redeem himself, otherwise he was going straight to hell for this. He lifted her t-shirts over her head, hands sliding over smooth, luminescent skin as he hardened beneath the heat of her intentions. She'd already made the decision for him far in advance of his own realisation, and now he found himself incapable of doing anything else but complying.

Baring them was simple, her clothing providing a barrier to the cold wooden floor as Doyle laid her down. He knelt over her, claiming her mouth in a kiss that left them both shaky, and when she clutched at his arm, he worried at overcoming her so easily. Not that it halted his motions, slow and steady but purposeful as his fingertips burnt a trail from her throat downwards, his body manoeuvring carefully into position above her. Tammy was regarding him with such perfect trust and desire he thought his heart might burst from the enormity of it all as she parted to him.

'Are you sure -?' he managed in a whisper, raising his head to look at her and taking her nod without further question. There weren't the words to say what he might have done if she'd disagreed. Instead, their bodies curved into one another, and he merely slowed when he felt her tremble and tense beneath him, light kisses of assurance pressed to her cheek, her temple, her lips. They were breathless, shifting and restless, strangers in perfect equilibrium. Doyle's hands curled under her shoulders, negating any possible gap between them as Tammy wrapped her legs tightly around him, closing him unbearable heat.

The end, when it came, was laudably blinding, but no more than a sigh from either one to punctuate what had taken place there in the dark between desperation and knowing better. He closed his eyes, forehead resting against the sharp plane of Tammy's collarbone, and he could feel her heart skittering in her chest. He wondered what he'd been thinking. 'I'm sorry,' he began thickly, but making no move to disentangle them.

'You needed it,' Tammy responded. And when he looked up, she was smiling.


	5. Requiem

**Disclaimer:** I don't own anything, it all belongs to people far richer than me.

**Author's Note: **The final chapter and let me tell you, it's been a killer. Literally. Anyway, I hope you enjoy it.

**Indelible**

_By_

_Silksteel_

_'I'll meet you there.'_

He'd been looking at Scarlet when he said it, but Tammy knew he'd been talking to her. Since the night before there had been a heightened awareness of each other, a covert knowledge of all that had passed between them. Once it was over there was no need to say anything more; Tammy didn't regret any of it – how could she when she might not live long enough to have the luxury of regret? She had lain there in the darkness and listened to him breathing, grateful that she was able to forget tomorrow, even for a moment.

After a while, Doyle had disentangled himself from her, pressing a brief, gentle kiss to her forehead. They dressed in silence, her gaze glancing off his shyly to be met by a casual grin. Tammy flushed at that, wriggling into her jeans to disguise her sudden unease. Outside, shrieks sounded in the distance, and they'd both hit the deck – Doyle still bare chested for the time he'd put into watching her. She could still feel the pounding of her own heart in her throat, her fingertips, and how it dissipated against all possible logic when the Sergeant pulled her beneath his body at the sound of footsteps on the stairs.

It had only been Scarlet. Whatever her thoughts, they hadn't been evident on her face. Andy joined them a moment later and the small party spent a restless night tormented by the noise from outside their stronghold. Doyle took the first watch as they settled into the darkest corner of the room, his rifle once more stationed across his knees in readiness for a fight he anticipated. The last thing she remembered before dropping into anxious sleep was his fingers combing tenderly through her hair.

--

They'd found an abandoned car in the city, chased back into District One by the Infected, only to run straight into their own people bent on destroying them. The gas took care of the more immediate issue, but flamethrowers weren't far behind and all the engine – having lain stagnant for months – could do was wheeze asthmatically. Tammy held her t-shirt up over her mouth and nose, smoke stinging her eyes and the back of her throat. Dying Infected had smeared vomited blood all over the car windows making it doubly hard to see out into the street, but she wasn't really sure she wanted to anyway. Scarlet was ramming at the gears in a slightly hysterical way.

'I'll meet you there.'

Doyle looked at his colleague, before glancing back, once significantly, to the rear seat. Then he was moving, climbing out of the relative safety of the car and instead taking up a bracing position at the back of it. Tammy could feel the tears begin to sting at her eyes, but she kept them locked on the Sergeant.

She watched as he began to push the car, corded tendons on his forearms – the only exposed part of his body – becoming visible with effort of it.

She watched as his warm brown eyes softened on hers, more reassurance conveyed in that contact than in all they had perpetrated the night before.

She watched as the uniformed men closed in, unaware or uncaring as to the status of their targets, blindly following orders, no better than the Infected themselves.

She watched his eyes as he was consumed by the flames; as his easy smile became a grimace of agony; as, with his final breath, the engine spluttered to life.

Tammy gripped weakly at the headrest, her breath coming in short, sharp sobs. They were moving now, the car speeding away from the pursuing soldiers but she only had eyes for one. His familiar features were obscured by flames as he fell to his knees in the street but in the subsequent days she would learn to draw them from memory. Though he hadn't known it when he died, Sergeant Jim Doyle had made a mark on her heart that was indelible.


End file.
